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SPRINGFIELD — State lawmakers today voted to give themselves 12 unpaid days off during the next year and rejected 1.1 percent cost-of-living increases. The proposal, sponsored by Sen. Dan Kotowski, D-Park Ridge, effectively would leave lawmakers' pay frozen because they took the same action a year ago. The measure, which already passed the House, went to the governor on a 48-4 vote. One opponent, Sen. Tom Johnson, R-West Chicago, suggested the move is little more than a public relations stunt. “This is somewhat pandering to an electorate, to say we are self-righteous enough to cut when we haven’t been able to cut the overall budget,” Johnson said. A...

I recently found an array of online job postings that greet seekers with these encouraging words: "MUST BE CURRENTLY EMPLOYED, NO EXCEPTIONS." How lovely. In a country with 13.9 million unemployed residents, that's akin to a restaurant...

Federal grand jurors have sought records of legislative scholarships handed out by Democratic state Rep. Dan Burke of Chicago, a sign that authorities kept up a probe of the tuition waiver program even as legislators were moving to end it this spring.On...

For more than a century, legislative scholarships had been an expression of political clout in Illinois. Lawmakers could give the valuable freebies – which essentially waived tuition and fees at a state unviersity – to whomever they chose. And many...

Gov. Pat Quinn today signed into law a bill to kill the long-abused legislative scholarship program."Instead of scholarships going to those who truly deserve them and qualify for scholarships to go to college, too often the program was abused in a...

A Chicago Democratic lawmaker charged with bribery a week ago won decisively in Tuesday's primary, the first election under a newly drawn map that shook up House and Senate seats from the city to the suburbs. Even before unofficial results rolled in,...

Looks like it's going to be an early night, as I don't see a squeaker anywhere*: My predicted winners: US Congress: Jesse Jackson Jr. (2nd), Tammy Duckworth (8th) and Adam Kinziger (16th) appear to be comfortably in the lead. Ilya ...